My mother has a delightful sense of imagination, and as young children, my siblings and I enjoyed many of the same holiday make-believe traditions that many American children raised in mainstream culture experience: hunting for Easter eggs, staying up late on Christmas Eve hoping to catch a glimpse of Santa, and placing teeth under our pillows in exchange for quarters from the Tooth Fairy. However, we were taught from a very young age that, while it's fun to read fairy tales and play make-believe about imaginary beings, entities such as the Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, and the Tooth Fairy don't really exist.
We knew that Mom hid the Easter eggs and filled our Easter baskets with candy, that Mom filled our stockings on Christmas Eve while Dad hauled the presents out of their various hiding places in the house to stack under the tree, and that either Mom or Dad managed to slip into our room, retrieve teeth and place quarters under pillows, all without waking us - a magical feat indeed! We enjoyed these traditions, but never had difficulty understanding that we were playing games of make-believe with our parents.
Another dedication to intellectual honesty my parents modeled was in the love of reading and research. When I asked a question, "Daddy, why...?" or "Daddy, how...?" or "Daddy, what is...?" Daddy didn't throw out a half-assed answer. No, if Daddy didn't know the answer to a question, say, about color of the sky, he would reply, "Destiny, get me the "S" encyclopedia." I would run to the hall bookcase, retrieve the appropriate volume, and run back. Dad and I would sit on the couch or at the kitchen table and read the relevant entry together. Occasionally, we'd end up surrounded by piles of volumes as we cross-referenced and sometimes, wander off-topic as we discovered interesting new entries to read.
I remember my mother mentioning at some point the reason her and my father didn't encourage belief in Santa Claus: they didn't want us to become confused about which childhood stories were true (stories about Jesus and the Bible) and which stories and traditions were just for fun (the Tooth Fairy, Cinderella, Santa Claus, etc.). While I appreciate my parents' dedication to honesty and truth as they saw it, I no longer believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible, or even necessarily in the existence of a supreme deity. It saddens me that my parents would probably see my new-found atheist-leaning agnostic philosophy not as the result of honest questioning, but as the road to eternal separation from God. Their version of intellectual honesty has certain boundaries.
There are some important qualities I can retain from my upbringing: intellectual curiosity and honesty to the best of my ability. If I do choose someday to procreate or adopt, I will answer my child(ren)'s questions honestly. I will help them develop skills to distinguish between fairy tales and reality: in holiday traditions, in children's literature, in popular culture, in politics, in history, in religion. I don't intend to raise my child(ren) in a religious tradition, but I do want them to learn about the myths that have so greatly influenced western culture, and I do want them to understand what their grandparents and great-grandparents believe. I will probably even raise them observing a few select religion-derived traditions.
If I do have children, I'll be raising them on an unfamiliar path - a childhood without God. I realize, as an imperfect person, there may be other beliefs I pass on, unwittingly, that are not true. But most importantly, I hope to instill in my children a love for questioning, for critical thinking, for discovering answers for themselves. My reply to a question, instead of "Get me the "S" encyclopedia," just may be "Let's Google it together."
